FAIR Christians for Fair
Witness on the Middle East
WITNESS 475 Riverside Drive,
Suite 1960
New York, New York
10115
(212) 870-2320
www.christianfairwitness.com
THE GENERAL
BOARD OF GLOBAL MINISTRIES’ RESOLUTION ON THE
ISRAEL-PALESTINE
CONFLICT IS BIASED AND UNBALANCED: Part 2
The General Board of Global Ministries (“GBGM”) has
submitted Petition Number 80441-GM-R323 on the “Israel-Palestine Conflict” to
the United Methodist General Conference.
While claiming to look towards
“a just and lasting peace” in the region,
the GBGM’s resolution follows a pattern of placing all the blame on
Israel and pointing out only Israel’s failings. The reference to the Biblical
commandment “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house,” characterizes Israeli self-defense as a land grab. The resolution also contains vague and inaccurate references to international
law.
3. GBGM’s
resolution on the Israel-Palestine Conflict claims that Israel’s security
barrier violates international law and heightens the insecurity of both
Palestinians and Israelis.HOWEVER . . . .
• Sovereign
nations have the right to self-defense under customary law and the U.N. Charter
as long as it is proportionate to the threat being addressed. Israelis are not the single exception to
this rule -- like all other people they have the fundamental right to live and
to defend themselves. Israel’s security
barrier was constructed in reaction to
the suicide bombing that began on September 29, 2000. From September 29, 2000 to December 6, 2005, 1,080 Israelis were
killed in terrorist attacks. Thousands
more were horribly maimed and wounded. After construction of the security
barrier began, the number of terrorist attacks in Israel has declined by more
than 90%. Israel’s security barrier
causes severe hardship and inconvenience for many Palestinians on the West
Bank, but it saves lives and meets the
requirement of proportionality. To not
recognize the barrier as legal and legitimate is to deny Israelis any right of
self-defense.
• The opinion issued in 2005 by the International Court of
Justice (“ICJ”) was “advisory,” and according to the ICJ’s powers under its own
charter, not one that Israel is required to accept.
• The ICJ’s opinion was self-contradictory and internally
inconsistent. For example, in its discussion of Jus Ad Bellum, the ICJ
ruled that Israel’s security
barrier is not justifiable self-defense
because the boundary between Israel and the West Bank is not an international boundary.
However, in its discussion of the International Law of Occupation, the
ICJ ruled that Israel was forbidden to undertake acts that might lead to
annexation because the boundary between Israel and the West Bank is an international boundary. The opinion thus appears to have been a
political decision rather than a legal one, and has proven highly controversial
at all ends of the political spectrum.
4. GBGM’s
resolution states that “May 2008 marks 60 years since the establishment of
Israel and the dispossession of 750,000 - 900,000 Palestinians who are still
seeking their full human rights. . . ”
HOWEVER . . . .
• The GBGM does not mention the Jewish refugees that were
dispossessed in roughly equal numbers during the 1948/49 war.
• Some 650,000- 900,000 Palestinians left their homes in
1947-48 for a variety of reasons.
Thousands of wealthy
Arabs left in anticipation of a war.
Once the war started some left to get out of harm’s way. Some left not
to appear to be traitors. It is also
well documented that many Arabs left after being told by the attacking Arab nations that they would destroy the Jewish
state after which the Arabs could go
back.
• Some Arabs were forced out during the war by the Israelis
-- especially Arabs living along supply routes and borders. Once the Arabs rejected the partition plan
and war broke out this was not a friendly situation on either side.
• The
Arabs that stayed in what became the borders of the new state of Israel became
Israeli citizens. The Arabs that fled
or were forced out became refugees. For
the most part they were never resettled and the United Nations maintained and
continues to maintain them as refugees in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and the
Palestinian Territories under a special agency created only for Palestinian
refugees -- United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in
the Near East ( UNRWA).
• Some 650,000 - 900,000 of Jews also became refugees. They fled or were forced out of the
Arab-controlled areas of mandatary Palestine where not a single Jew was
permitted to remain, and from the Arab nations.
• The Palestinians
have found themselves scattered and rejected in the Arab world at large,
excluded from participation in the Arab nations where many settled after 1948,
confined to refugee camps, and victims of the venal politics of their own
leaders. They were subject to
displacement either voluntary or involuntary during 1947-48, extreme
discrimination from their hosts in Arab countries after 1948 and more recently
and especially since the Second Initifada, very tough restrictions and controls
under the Israelis. They have suffered
and continue to suffer powerlessness and deprivation. They alone have not yet
attained sovereignty. But for the GBGM to portray their plight as the
result of Israeli aggression and
maltreatment only is a blatant distortion of fact and of history.
5. GBGM’s
resolution calls upon all parties to abide by and uphold U.N. resolutions.
HOWEVER . . . .
• The
UMC should be mindful of the fact that the United Nations has a disturbing
record of issuing myriad resolutions condemning Israel while substantially
ignoring areas of international conflict and severe human rights violations in
countries such as China, Tibet, Saudi Arabia, Zimbabwe, Burma or Myanmar to
name just a few.
• The vast majority of U.N. Security Council resolutions
regarding Israel have been adopted under Chapter Six and therefore, according
to the U.N. Charter, represent nothing more than recommendations. They do not
bind Israel’s actions or the action of other states and are not part of the
body of international law. The only Chapter Seven (binding) resolutions that
have been adopted regarding Israel are: (i) one during the 1948-49 War that
called for and led to a cease-fire; and (ii) arguably, the one at the end of
the Second Israel-Lebanon War in 2006 (the authority of the resolution is not
clear – it may be Chapter Six or Seven) which called for a cease fire, which,
again, Israel abided by.
United Methodists Can Help Bring Peace To The Holy Land By
Encouraging Negotiations: Not By Writing One-Sided Resolutions That Distort
Facts and Misstate Law in the Service of Blaming the Entire Conflict on Israel